Life and Novel Interruptus

How are you today? I hope you are having a super day, preparing for the holidays and writing projects. (And also a bit of YOU-time, so necessary.)

How’s your writing life? Or rather how is life that can interfere with writing? Or just how is life?

We’re all dealing with busy lives and sometimes it’s just too difficult to continue writing, or ad work, or whatever needs coordinating, etc. I’m just getting back on track a bit after a packed year and a half in which I lost a loved one, moved states, sold a home in one, dealt with my own brief illness, traveled from California to Missouri and back multiple times.

So yes, I’ve experienced Novel Interruptus big time. Every writer has a time like this and when returning to writing and/or the business of writing, the bulk of what needs to be done is intimidating. At the moment, my whole book line-up needs attention, plus my website, and just about everything else.

Cheer up. Take it easy and do what you can do. Do the menial stuff, just to get back into the flow. If you've had devastation/death/sickness in your life, it's no mere jump back into writing and business. I found immense re-start-up help in Kilby Blades book for pros, The Marketing Audit: Get Better Results with a Better Plan. Excellent read, pinpointing how to review and revamp, made on the writer’s individual needs. I am thankful to the author who recommended Blades' book.

My audit showed me what to do, 3 major revamps. I’ve just begun step 1.

And just now, I’m getting into a little business. At the top of last year, I published 2 books of a new series, Fresh Start, and I’m just now lining up and reviewing characters to return to book 3. Thankfully, I have a lot of notes for reference.

Speaking of notes: Today, I dug out my smaller 3-ring binder, cleaned it up, and got ready for notes, which are business notes, separate from my story notes. I'm a list-maker, and my binder includes lots of to-do lists. I found that I just work better with an actual binder than keeping all electronically (tho I do some). Just getting that binder ready, along with notes from a previous binder, provided a chip in the mountain of work that has waited. Yes, back to good old paper notes.

Maybe you’re ready for an audit, too? How you schedule tasks? A redo of covers or retail pages?  Monday is my usual business day, which was waylaid during the last year and a half, but I’m back to trying that now.

The most difficult time of coming back to writing, or the business of writing, is to find those first little steps to get started. Novel Interruptus is just that: a temporary and usually necessary life-brick thrown at you. Find some basic grab on where you were, prior to the life-brick thrown at you, lock onto the simplest task and build from there.

Difficult to remember during stress times, but it's the simple things, right? (Sometimes I off-load with crocheting as on my keyboard. Off-Loading is prime stress relief, but so are the checkmarks placed on my To-Do list. )